The burden of the past

The last Saturday that Rachy-Rach was still here in Hawaii we loaded everyone into the car and headed off to visit Pearl Harbor. It was nice to have an excuse to spend a day at the Arizona Memorial, since we've been here eight months already. I had hoped to go last month when another family member visited, but that anonymous person went without us. He's kind of a CEO bigshot and probably didn't want our little family slowing him down while he hob-knobbed with important state officials. Anyway, I'm glad Rachel didn't mind going with us.

As anyone who has visited it knows, Pearl Harbor is not a light-hearted experience. As we walked from the car towards the visitor's center a national parks official flagged us down to inform us that we couldn't take in any bags into the buildings. He also reminded us that the memorial was a cemetery and so we should instruct our children to act accordingly. After giving the kids a stern warning and stuffing my pockets full of diapers, wipes, and Desitin, we were ready to experience history.

Despite our best intentions to treat the proceedings with an appropriately somber demeanor, I had a hard time at the beginning of the film. Before watching the documentary on the events of December 7, 1941, a park official introduces the film. This guy delivered a dramatic monologue that combined an exagerated melancholy tone with a truly flamboyant sense of gay-ness. The effect was so comical it became impossible to listen to his account, and I had to look away in order to maintain my stoic expression. My mind recalled a similar experience once...long ago...at a ward talent show.

Still, for a history student Pearl Harbor is a fascinating site of memory. The film does an excellent job telling the narrative of Japan's decision to attack the United States naval base in Hawaii. The Japanese never intended to invade the U.S., only to put its navy out of commission for a period of eighteen months. They hoped to complete their conquest of Southeast Asia and China without American interference. By the time the US had rebuilt its navy, the task of dislodging the Japanese from their strongholds would hopefully be too daunting. But the attack at Pearl Harbor was actually a bigger disaster for Japan than for the United States. The aircraft carriers were not present, and the perceived treachery united public opinion in favor of war, while silencing the isolationists. There is mounting evidence that Roosevelt knew of the attack beforehand, but didn't warn his admirals because he felt America would need to get its nose bloodied before it could present a united front against the Axis.

For Hawaiians, Pearl Harbor represents a different type of loss. During the war between the states, Hawaiian planters grew rich from selling sugar cane to the Union. After the war, Louisiana sugar barons moved to protect their domestic market by demanading that the federal government place tariffs on all imported sugar. In desperation, the sugar lobby in Hawaii offered Washington Pearl Harbor as a naval base in exchange for free access to American markets. Under pressure from white planters, the king signed Pearl Harbor over to the US navy. Many Hawaiians have still not forgiven whites for this historical injustice.

Some of them periodically exact revenge by beating up little red-headed fifth graders.